Enemy of the State
by bionic4ever
Summary: NLNL3: Oscar is arrested for treason!
1. Chapter 1

**Enemy of the State**

_(NOTE:I have begun coding my stories, so you can tell which ones follow which plot. Example: New Lives,New Loves is (NLNL1). __Death Do Us Part, which follows, is (NLNL2). This story follows that, and is (NLNL3)._

Chapter One - 10/12/78 - 11:45am

A man of Oscar's stature within the government should've seen it coming and been prepared for it, but Oscar, preoccupied with the annulment papers Jaime had returned to him - signed - that morning, had been completely blindsided. His office door flew open, a hole straight through the middle of it. _Damn_, he thought, _second door in two days._ When he saw Jack Hansen and two of his NSB cronies coming at him with guns drawn, he realized this would be much worse than facing an angry Steve Austin. Jaime's papers fell from his hand and scattered beneath his desk. Something told Oscar he wouldn't be filing them today, after all.

Hansen stepped forward and Oscar came around the desk to meet him. "Oscar Goldman," Hansen said sternly, "You are officially remanded immediately to NSB custody as an Enemy of the State, pending possible charges of Conspiracy and Treason."

"What?" Oscar was stunned.

Hansen explained while Oscar was being handcuffed. "Seems you have a wife locked up downstairs, in our wing. A Commie wife. Didn't mention her when you were promoted to Director, did you? Slip your mind? Now she's conveniently back in the country. My friend, you are in major, _major_ trouble."

As he was being led from the office, Oscar turned to his stunned secretary. "Call Rudy. Until I get a lawyer, he can get in to see me downstairs."

"What about Jaime?" she called out as he was going out the door.

"_Call Rudy_!"

------------

10/12/78 - 4:30pm

Rudy Wells knew he had to find Jaime. He tried Oscar's house, and then Jaime's old apartment, both with no success. Callahan thought she might have left with Steve, so, growing desperate, he drove to Steve's house and pounded on the door. The doctor finally had a stroke of good luck when Steve answered the door.

"Rudy?" Steve saw the stricken look on Rudy's face and quickly ushered him in. "What is it; what's wrong?"

"I really need to see Jaime. It's urgent - is she here?"

"She's sleeping, for the first time in two days. Is...she sick?" Steve asked, frightened by Rudy's agitation.

"It's about Oscar -"

"Jaime's heard that name enough today. She's been through hell."

"I understand, Steve, and I'm sorry. But I really need to see her."

"Rudy?" Jaime appeared in the hallway that led from the guest bedroom. She'd been lying down, but not sleeping. She saw the doctor's stricken manner and nearly dropped to her knees. Steve was immediately at her side like a well-trained guard-dog. "My God," she whispered, "he's had a heart attack..."

"No, Honey," Rudy said, trying to calm her so he could give her news that would devastate her all over again. He wished there was some other way, but she was Oscar's only hope. "I think we should all sit down first," he suggested.

Jaime was already shaking so badly she could barely stand. Steve helped her to the loveseat and sat beside her, holding her hand. When that didn't seem to comfort her, he placed an arm around her shoulders, and she rested her head on his arm and seemed a little steadier.

"What happened to him?" she asked in a quivering voice. "Is he alright?"

"No, Honey, I'm afraid he isn't," Rudy said grimly.

"He's - in the hospital?"

"Jaime, he's in a holding cell in the NSB catacombs underneath our building."

"I don't understand. What did he do?"

Steve got the picture immediately. "Natalie, I mean Natalia." Rudy nodded.

"What is he charged with?" Jaime asked.

"The NSB can actually hold him without charging him, but he's looking at Conspiracy charges, and Treason."

"Treason." Jaime tried to absorb it. "They - they execute people for that."

"Yes, they do," Rudy confirmed.

"What does Jaime have to do with any of this?" Steve wanted to know. "They're not married anymore. With the annulment, they never were."

Rudy took a huge breath. "He hadn't filed the paperwork yet when they grabbed him."

"We're still - married?"

"I spoke to the lawyer representing Oscar," Rudy explained, "and he said that all depends on you Honey. You can still file those papers and be done with it -"

"And let them kill Oscar..."

"Or you can go to court and try to prove you are the legal wife of Oscar Goldman and it's the other marriage that's invalid."

"Now, wait a minute," Steve protested.

Jaime leaned forward, fully in the conversation. Rudy looked at her sadly. "Honey, it's a lot to ask of anyone, especially when you've already been hurt by all of this. If you succeeded, though, they'd have no case against him. You're his only hope, Jaime."

"Goldman screws up his own life - and hers - and now he expects her to fix it?" Steve was livid.

"No," Rudy corrected. "In fact, he told me to give Jaime the annulment papers and insist she file them in the morning."

"I wanna talk to him," Steve insisted.

"You can't get in there. Neither can I, now that he has an attorney. The only ones who can see him are his lawyer...and his wife."


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter Two - 10/12/78 - 5:40pm

"Now, wait a minute," the NSB guard said. "You're - who?"

"I'm Jaime Goldman, Oscar Goldman's wife, and I want to see my husband. Now."

"That's impossible. He's married to the Commie spy who -"

"No. He's married to me. Unless you want me to sue the entire NSB, starting with you, once I prove it in court, you'll open that door and let me go downstairs. I am not kidding."

The guard shrugged. "Suit yourself." He opened the door, and as she went down the stairs, jaime felt as though she was descending straight into hell itself. It was cold, poorly lit, filthy and damp. Her knees buckled when she pictured Oscar in this horrible place.

She stopped at the downstairs guard station to check in and catch her breath. The guard at the desk took one look at her and shook his head. "Ma'am, you don't belong down here."

"Neither does my husband. I'm here to see Oscar Goldman."

She looked frightened and very pale, and the guard decided to give her a bit of a break and let her see him in the interrogation room, instead of in his cell. He motioned to a door behind the desk. "Wait in there. I'll bring him to you. I'll have to lock you in there with him, but it's still better than the cells.

"Thank you." Jaime looked around the little room and her heart sank. It, too, was dark and damp, with grey walls and a cement floor. If it was better than a cell, she couldn't bear to think of the horrors Oscar was having to endure.

In minutes, the door opened and Oscar shuffled in, shackled. The door was immediately locked behind him, and the sound made Jaime cringe. Looking at her husband, Jaime could feel her heart breaking. He was dressed in something that resembled grey burlap - was everything grey in here? - and he seemed to have aged 20 years in the space of a few hours.

"Oh, Oscar!" Jaime threw her arms around him. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry!"

Although he couldn't really hold her, Oscar was able to move his arms enough to draw her closer. "Don't be sorry, Babe. This is my fault," he said softly. Slowly, they moved to the two wooden chairs, and jaime helped oscar sit down before drawing the other chair as close as possible so they were sitting knee-to-knee.

"I'm going to court tomorrow morning," she told him. "I'm gonna get you out of here."

"The annulment papers," he said in a broken voice, "Rudy was supposed to -"

"He gave 'em to me; I got rid of them."

"Jaime, why? What I did, it was inexcusable."

"But I was wrong, too, Oscar. I know there was more to the story, and I left without giving you the chance to tell it. And regardless of what happened between us, you don't deserve to be here. They wanna execute you!"

"I'm alright with that," he said softly. "I probably deserve -"

"No!" Jaime insisted. "No, you don't!"

"If you do this, Babe, if you go to court, you're giving up any chance of getting an annulment - ever."

"I know. And there is one condition: you need to tell me everything, no matter how ugly. I need to hear all of it, so I'll know what to tell the judge."


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter Three

"Seven years ago, I was the OSI's Assistant Director," Oscar began. Jaime took his hand through the shackles. She knew this was probably the last thing he wanted to talk about. "My boss, the Director, brought Natalia to my office because I was closer to her in age than he was, and he thought I could establish a better rapport."

"She was either scared out of her mind, or one hell of an actress." Oscar closed his eyes for a second at the thought that it could've all been one elaborate deception. Jaime squeezed his hand a little tighter for encouragement and he continued. "She'd been working with a group of rebels, trying to overthrow the government."

"Russia?"

"Right. She decided they were wrong and she disagreed with their methods, so she wanted out, which meant they wanted her dead. Her own government, because of her ties to the rebels, wanted her killed as well. She came here to defect for two reasons: to stay alive, and to bring down the rebels, even if she had to do it from our side. I guess there was an attraction there from the beginning, and once we really got to work, we had to spend a lot of time together, and..."

"And you fell in love," Jaime concluded.

"Not overnight, but yes. One day, out of gratitude for my making her safe, she kissed me. Lightly at first, on the cheek. But she didn't stop there, and the kiss grew until I was as...um...enthusiastic as she was. So the sex came first, then the relationship, which should've been my first clue that it was a mistake. She was a mistake."

"She seduced you into a relationship," Jaime summarized, feeling his pain like a knife through her own heart.

"Don't make excuses for me, Jaime; I don't deserve it. I shouldn't have let it happen. But before I knew it, we were getting married. Either I didn't think it through or was only thinking below the belt - I don't know. Three days later, I woke up and she was gone."

"How awful," Jaime whispered, reaching over to gently touch his face.

"Natalia claims now that the rebel group had found her, and rather than endanger me, she went back with them voluntarily. It took six weeks of intensive searching before they told me she was dead and gave me that horrible picture to prove it. She claims she was being re-indoctrinated into the group, and the picture was her, unconscious, after an especially severe beating."

"Oscar, I can't even begin to imagine the pain you must've gone through..."

"I had no reason to doubt my sources. Turns out they were mislead as well. I put the whole awful mess behind me and told no one - not even you - because it potentially pointed at me as being connected to the Communists."

"How did Steve become part of her equation?"

"About a year and a half ago, when Rudy and I let Steve believe you'd died rather than tell him about your amnesia, I sent him to Thailand the first time, and...no...oh, my God - we did the same thing to Steve that Natalia's people did to me!"

"No, Oscar. The motives were totally different. Rudy and Michael told you I probably wasn't gonna make it, and you were trying to spare Steve more pain."

Oscar didn't answer, hanging his head as tears of realization formed in his eyes. Jaime tenderly brushed them away and gave him a gentle kiss. "You sent him to Thailand," she prompted.

"And he passed through Russia on the way, to meet a contact. The rebels knew I'd been promoted, knew Steve was OSI, and sent Natalia to insinuate herself into his life."

"Ultimately to get her re-connected with you?"

Oscar nodded. "It took two more trips to Thailand before she succeeded. The first time she came here, I believe Natalia was telling the truth. When she came back with Steve, though, her group had sent her to kill me and throw the OSI into turmoil so they could go about whatever it is they're doing now, unimpeded by U.S. intelligence. That, Babe, is the entire story, beginning to end."

"Oscar, we've got a case here! I can win this!"

"Meaning we would still be married."

"Right now, I want you out of here with all charges dropped. That's all I'm worried about. I'll need exact dates. And the picture, if you still have it."

"Go in my desk. Second drawer from the bottom on the left-hand side. Take everything out and jiggle the bottom. It'll open, and there's a file there with everything you'll need. Jaime, are you sure you want to do this?"

"Ten thousand percent. I don't wanna leave you in this place, but I've got a lot of work to do before tomorrow morning." She kissed him one more time, then rang for the guard. "Oscar, I do love you, and everything's gonna be ok."


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter Four - 10/13/78 - 12:30am

"Jaime, have you completely lost every single cell of your mind?" Steve paced across his living room, over and over, trying to absorb what she was telling him. "After everything he's done, everything he's put you through, you're gonna stay _married_ to him?"

"Would you rather see him executed?"

"Of course not," he snapped at her, then lowered his voice. "Sweetheart, you've cried more tears in the last day and a half than most people should have to shed in a lifetime. I can't help being angry with the person who caused those tears."

"Steve, I still love him," Jaime said, very quietly. "Yes, he made some wrong decisions, but he was victimized, too. You're my best friend - and i thought you were Oscar's friend."

"I was! I am, but Jaime, after he hurt you -"

"He's hurting too!" she practically shouted. "Look, if you're really my friend, help me. If not, get the hell out of my way."

"Of course, I'm your friend," Steve told her. To himself, he thought _Ok - last chance before she goes back to him._ Before he could actually think about what he was doing, Steve pulled Jaime into his arms and, holding her close, put all the love and passion they'd ever shared into one long kiss. For a moment, Jaime was startled and began to pull away, but was shocked to find herself surrendering instead, her lips melting into his. Somewhere in the far recesses of her mind, a light flickered on and moved forward, strong and bright.

Jaime's eyes grew wide as she realized what was happening. Something in her subconscious had awakened, whether she was ready or not. The kiss seemed to go on forever, but as if by silent signal, they both pulled away before reaching a point of no return. "I've...got...a lot of work to do," she said, breathing heavily. "Court...in the morning."

10/13/78 - 11:30am

"All rise! Court is again in session."

Jaime stood at a table beside Oscar's lawyer. The judge had taken less than half an hour to make his decision. Was that good or bad? She glanced behind her, where Rudy and Steve gave her strong, reassuring smiles. She swung her hands back, just a little, and they each squeezed one for luck.

"Be seated." Oscar was not in the courtroom, the NSB arguing the security risk was too great. the judge, bailiff and a stenographer had met with him at 7am to take his statement, which was later read before the court.

Steve, despite what had almost happened between him and Jaime the night before, had testified eloquently on his friends' behalf. He talked about the special, visible bond they shared, and their obvious love for each other. Before stepping down, Steve turned to the judge for one final statement: "Your Honor, if this is not a valid marriage, then there is no such thing."

Jaime, herself, had spent nearly two hours on the stand and she knew she'd done the very best she could. Was it enough? The judge's face gave no clues.

"This is a highly unusual case," he began. "While marital laws are quite clear, this case fits into none of them. After seven years, Mr. Goldman could've had the first woman declared dead or he could've charged abandonment of the marriage, but why would he do any of these when he held evidence in his possession that showed him to be a widower?"

"The plaintiff, the allegedly current spouse, makes a very strong case on an emotional level in addition to the facts and evidence she has presented. However, this case cannot be decided on emotion. There is a fact that has not been presented to the court that I feel must be considered as well. The plaintiff had more than adequate grounds to have her marriage annulled and has chosen instead to appear here and fight for its validity. That speaks highly of the state of this couple's union. However, there is a law coming into play here which must supercede any other evidence presented.

"The original, alleged wife, having been a member of a foreign, counter-intelligence faction, chose to return to that group voluntarily. What may have happened to her after that is most unfortunate, but has no bearing on this case. The papers she signed immediately before the marriage, in preparation for defection and eventual citizenship, renounced all claims and affiliations with this group. This was obviously untrue."

"Therefore, my ruling is that Mr. Goldman's first marriage was never valid to begin with, on the grounds of fraud, deception and criminal activity. He had no knowledge of, or participation in, her activities within this group, therefore any and all charges against him are ordered rescinded and expunged immediately. His marriage to the plaintiff is legal and binding in the eyes of the law."

"Mrs. Goldman, would you please rise? The court has one further request to make of you. You are to go immediately to where your husband is being held, take him home, and get started on 'Happily Ever After'." Finally, the judge smiled. "Court is adjourned."

END


End file.
